


Watcher of the Skies

by TessellateOcean



Category: Mr. Robot (TV)
Genre: M/M, tyrelliot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-07
Updated: 2016-06-29
Packaged: 2018-07-12 19:38:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,998
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7119676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TessellateOcean/pseuds/TessellateOcean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elliot considers himself the world's watcher; he thinks he knows how the system all functions. Tyrell knows this, and everything Elliot doesn't, because he's the one who's really been paying attention. But when Tyrell comes to tell Elliot the truth about his nature, he discovers that he, too, can be a mystery to himself...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Chapter 1 is tasteful ruminating, Chapter 2 is tasteful...smut. There may be stylistic differences between the two chapters, because ch.1 is a translation from the Spanish I originally wrote it in (though English is my native language), and ch. 2 I wrote in English from the get-go. Hope you like!

The watcher. The witness. That’s what he considered himself to be. Tyell knew it, precisely because he himself was the true watcher of the skies. And that was the difference between them. Elliot thought he knew everything about everyone, and yet the real truth of it all would always elude him, lost in that devastating blind spot that was the secret of his own nature. How could someone think himself versed in the arcane machinations of the world, from the macroscopic churning of global capitalism down to the pedestrian pangs and slights it inflicted on the private lives—and psyches—of every individual, when he himself had no sense of self? There was nothing that could truly be understood if one had not taken that first step towards self awareness, to begin to realize the point one occupied in the cluttered and inscrutable web of lies that called itself the real world.

Such awareness was wholly Tyrell’s ken, that with which he obsessed himself. It was his particular specialty. He had never known anyone who had understood the game better than he, who had a more exact sense of his own place in the world—the role that each was born to play, the one that the vast majority of the masses would never begin to attempt, or even dream of—perhaps only with the exception of his wife, Joanna. But no—Joanna had that cruelty of hers, and sometimes it blinded her to certain realities. Of course Tyrell himself at times acted in ways that he knew others would consider cruel, but the fact was that he always acted out of the necessity dictated to him by his ego and ambition. Joanna, on the other hand, committed her horrors simply for the pleasure they gave her. It was something he respected in her, surely, that she was utterly free of sentimentality, but she also took it too far; it became a vulnerability. Sometimes it weakened her hold on objectivity. And one could never lose sight of that if one wanted to understand how the world really was.

It interested him, this way in which Elliot viewed himself. _How can someone with such huge eyes be so blind?_ he wondered wryly. Nevertheless, the question was a fascinating one. He was fascinating. Tyrell tried, but could never even begin to imagine, how it might feel to be Elliot. They were similar in some respects, but in others, opposites; reflections staring back at each other, reversed in the face of some cosmic mirror. There was that one difference above all others: that the sum of what made Tyrell himself, or the framework with which he regarded his existence, relied on all the fine threads and thick cords of relationships and connections between his intimate inner self and everything beyond his skin. The inner and the outer were separate, different, but wholly symbiotic. Whereas while Elliot felt himself at the conscious level to be constantly guarding the secrets of his inner world, and though he tried to move through his surroundings as though he lacked a physical presence (a ghost, a hologram, a projection—the security of being incorporeal), the truth was he didn’t actually exist inside, at least not in any useful way. If existence was predicated upon one’s knowledge of one’s self, Elliot did not exist. He was an empty shell inside; maybe just lost, maybe an endless black hole or a yawning abyss. _Yes_ , thought Tyrell, _absolutely fascinating_ …

_______________________________________

And now he stood before him. Tyrell stood in his apartment, breathing in his air, lit up by the light of his lamp. How alive he felt! He exhaled deeply, the shadow of a smile playing at the corner of his mouth. This, then was his moment. The moment in which he would tell him everything, when Elliot would finally come to understand himself. There was something pathetic in it, Tyrell reflected, that Elliot needed someone else to tell him who he was, but that was how it stood. The prophet would reveal God’s Word to Him. Well, then—Tyrell had designated himself the messenger.

Tyrell had slipped in silently the moment that Darlene had left. He pressed his finger to his lips urgently, watching how Elliot’s huge eyes grew wider, filling his face in their shock. He waved his hand to silence the millions of questions he could see flooding Elliot’s eyes. Tyrell had neither the interest nor the time for them.

“Elliot,” he began, by way of introduction, “I can see that you’re confused.” Elliot opened his mouth to speak, and again Tyrell canceled the impulse with an irritable wave of his hand. “Before you have your say, I’m going to have mine. And I’m sure that what I have to tell you is going to fill up that head of yours with even more questions; so, if you don’t mind, let’s just skip that part of the show for now.”

Elliot obeyed silently, closing his mouth with an expression of total disorientation fixed on his face. “Great. Thanks.” Tyrell smiled a little to himself, weighing how to proceed. “First, then: you are not who you think you are. Or, better said, you are not only who you think you are. Not just Elliot Alderson: lowly tech, drug addict, socially crippled.” Tyrell noted how Elliot flinched at this succinct description of himself. “Also…” Tyrell studied Elliot’s face closely. “…You are God.

“My God, at least,” he continued, shrugging a little. “But I think it’s safe to say that very shortly you will be the one God of all the rest of mankind as well. Elliot, you—and you alone—have managed to realize the dream of all of humanity. Don’t you see? You have made the ultimate sacrifice, and by doing so, you have given us the ultimate miracle. You have saved us.” He smiled widely, opening his arms in a gesture of magnanimity that seemed to reflect the generosity of which he spoke.

“All these long months of late you’ve felt yourself falling into madness. You’ve wondered about your identity, you’ve looked in vain for the edges of your self. But I can explain it all to you now. You have no edges, because you are limitless. You were looking for what you would never be able to find, because the one you were looking for never existed. As I say—you are God.

“The salvation that I’m describing to you only could have been brought about through your own fragmentation. Do you see? No man can save the world. Particularly not Elliot Alderson. What a mess you are; you can’t even see the extent of it. But—like Abraham with Isaac, like God with his only son, like Jesus for the sake of all men—you have sacrificed your most precious possession, indeed the only thing you had—that is, your sanity, Elliot, and with it your selfhood—for the sake of us all. And like all sacrifices, I don’t think it can be undone. Every miracle has its price, and you, Elliot, have paid for this one.

“I know what you’re thinking. The answer is yes, you did it all; obviously you are Mr. Robot. But haven’t you been listening to me? I’m telling you that you are also _more_ than all that—more than you can imagine. And in this respect you are a singular god. We always speak of gods thinking that they’re omniscient; we love them because they act with purpose, with the full knowledge of their grand design, with utter and perfect control. But you, you don’t fit the mold. In fact, quite the opposite: had you even begun to understand the part for which you were destined, you would have destroyed it all. You are a god who had to keep your secrets even—and especially—from yourself. You had to deny the truth of your being in order that you might reveal the Truth. How…interesting.”

Tyrell paused to observe the impact his words were having on his audience. As he could have guessed, it seemed that some time in the midst of his monologue, Elliot had gone into shock; his wide eyes stared fixedly ahead without seeming to see anything, his mouth parted in an expression of horror.

Tyrell reached out and put his hand on the other’s shoulder. _What am I doing?_  he wondered with a feeling that he had almost never experienced—confusion; indecision, even. Even more surprisingly, Elliot did not recoil at the touch; he seemed to come back to himself suddenly, gasping quietly and then closing his eyes, tears streaming down his face.

But what a strange sensation! Tyrell was not accustomed to not understanding himself. And yet here he was, and maybe for the first time, he didn’t know what he was feeling. His purpose in coming here tonight was to finally unmask Elliot to himself: the younger man had accomplished the feat, and there was no more risk to be had in revealing to him his true status. He never could have imagined that he would be feeling…but what was that? Sympathy? No— _compassion_ —for him. _Mercy_. And yet suddenly he felt it. Suddenly he did not wish to be the cause of the seemingly unbearable pain that had transformed the face of the person who stood before him.

If he was not accustomed to feeling compassion, how much less equipped was he to give comfort. _How are these things done?_ he wondered, his hand still resting motionless on Elliot’s shoulder. And still he could not understand the impulses that seemed to be rushing through his body beyond his control. He needed to rationalize them. Where were they coming from?

 _My God_. Yes, he had meant his words. Elliot was his God. Complex, strange, above all, transcendental. Tyrell had felt many things towards Elliot, but now he was left with only one: wonder. A profound desire was filling him wordlessly like a vast internal ocean, defying all reason. Suddenly Tyrell realized that he had been a man standing on the edge of the shore—and here, in the form of the man who stood before him, was the tide come to sweep him out to sea.

He thought no more. He took Elliot’s face in his hands, eyes still closed, and drew him to him in the deepest kiss of his life.


	2. Chapter 2

He floated, immobile and yet somehow standing, for a long time—it might have been years, months, sunsoaked days stretching into hushed nights, or longest of all, mere seconds, each one fractured into a million tiny facets of eternity. And then he pulled back. Their eyes seemed to have opened simultaneously; it could not be otherwise, for the fierce grip of their gaze had never left the other’s, both breathing as one, each looking out of the other’s eyes, perhaps.

Tyrell exhaled. So _that_ was what he had been waiting for. What a feeling. Never to know what was missing until suddenly, so wholly improbably, you found yourself fulfilled.

Elliot had been very still, but now Tyrell could see he was panting, slightly breathless. There was a light sheen of sweat on his forehead, and the hooded outlines of his eyes were shadowed. His lips were pale and slightly chapped. Taking in the full sensations of him—the sound of his breathing, his scent, the curve of his shoulder blades on his thin frame, his eyes now downcast, dark and unreachable—made Tyrell go half mad all over again. He wanted to draw him into himself, draw in his breath from their shared lips, get as close and as deep as he could go.

Humanity’s greatest curse, Tyrell intuited suddenly, was its dualities: I and Thou, myself and my lover, always separate but always desiring only to be one and whole at last. Elliot, he knew well, was something more than him—God, yes, he had said it, moreover, truly felt it—but he could not help but feel that if only he did _something,_ something his body would dictate rather than his mind reason, he might join them, somehow, if only for an instant. Even an instant might be enough.

“All this time, watching you…” Tyrell found himself speaking, astonishing himself that he could get any words out, not knowing what he was saying. “…And I never knew, until now. What it was all for…”

Elliot looked up, the question full in his face. He needed something from Tyrell that only Tyrell could give.

“You wanted to save the world,” said Tyrell. “I wanted you to save me.”

He drew him into him again, forcefully this time, the undercurrent of violence lashing as the tidal wave within him suddenly broke. He drew Elliot in closer, harder into the kiss, gripping from behind his neck, feeling the heat and the sweat of him in his own cold hands. No words for this; images: a dark passageway, a turned key, a doorway filled with light; a distant harbor, a single boat, an untold shore; legions of masked men, millions, filling a red square, bowing down before… _what?_ —a new world order…

Tears were streaming down his face. He could not contain the violence in his body, the need and the hunger and the ecstasy of having everything he might have asked of the universe here, in one being, this beautiful, perfect boy pressed under his kiss, locked in his wasting caress. He had become the destroyer of worlds.

He pulled back again, to be able to see Elliot and show him in his own face what he needed from him now. Elliot’s face was shining; he was ready; he too could only respond to whatever need was coursing beyond and between them, driving them inexorably onwards.

Tyrell pulled off Elliot’s hoodie, clumsy in his need, tossing it carelessly to the floor. Elliot mirrored him, fingering the buttons on Tyrell’s shirt, then pulling it off his tight shoulders to the floor. Elliot ran his hands down Tyrell’s chest, eyes seeming to swallow up his form. Tyrell roughly pulled Elliot’s shirt over his head and then kicked off his pants; Elliot followed suit. They held each other, then, for a moment, bare skin connecting them seamlessly, drawing them onwards, showing them how they could get closer.

They fell onto the bed, a tumble of limbs, unable to stop kissing and grinding their hands and legs into one another to make sense of themselves. Suddenly Elliot went limp and unresponsive, meeting Tyrell’s eyes wordlessly, urging him to do it. Tyrell complied. They both needed this so much. If only he could stop how violently he was shaking, if only he could do this right.

Elliot was lying on his back, his eyes wide and expectant, his beautiful olive chest glinting with sweat, his arms drawn back behind his head in repose. God. Yes. He would give him anything and everything.

Tyrell finally, then, saw his own purpose. God needed a witness. He was made to give testimony to this being sprawled before him.

He fumbled in the drawer beside the bed and found lube there. He slathered himself up quickly, worried he wouldn’t be able to hold off for much longer, wanting only to prolong every second of pleasure he might give to Elliot. Elliot’s eyes were half-closed, his mouth parted—oh God, he would have to look elsewhere, somehow, if he was going to last a second.

He slid in to Elliot as slowly and gently as he could in his haste, inhaling sharply as he felt themselves draw nearer to it. Their union, yes—they were almost there. He held Elliot’s shoulders, bent down as he drew deeper in, kissing his neck, his jaw, trying to make sense of it and find his mouth, threatening every second to be overcome by it all. Elliot’s eyes were closed tightly, brow knitted in concentration and sensation, loosening slightly as he drew back, tightening in pain and pleasure as he drew in. Oh God Oh God Oh God Oh God Oh God—!

“GOD!” Tyrell roared as his body finally jerked to split himself in two. On some level outside of himself he was aware of Elliot’s body jerking beneath his, tightening around him, the wetness coming off of him, but it was all relegated to the plane of sensation rather than comprehension. Waves on waves on waves of pulsing light rushed behind his closed eyelids. Cloudburst coolness drenched his mind. Heat exploded from his body. Oh _God_ —!

No images anymore. Not even feelings existed here. It was only power. He could do nothing but be given over to it, sense with every atom of himself the pure wonder of it all.

He drew out and dropped to the side, chest heaving, heart pounding, tingling as he felt the energy continue to radiate out of him. Oh, God.

Elliot was spent, breathing ragged and eyelids fluttering. To see him like that—how could he ever do anything but watch him, need to be one with him and yet also get to look him over as he did now, so hungrily he would never be satisfied, would surely die of the famine of it? The question above all: how could he have never felt this before? Clearly he had, in some way, but it was the attraction of a deep need, not _this_ , this wrecking force that wrought and ruined in its purity and potency.

Tyrell slid down the bed so that they lay side by side, facing one another. There was no question of where they went from here, what he would ever do now. It was no question because he could not think outside the moment enough to ask himself it. Kiss. Let fingers caress the nape of the neck, dance down the chest. Kiss again. Drape leg over thigh, interlace fingers, toes, limbs. Kiss again. There would be no leaving this place. He could never be swept back in from this tide.


End file.
